Slip, Sliding Away

Today the kids, myself and our friend Jody ventured south to Snowhaven, a small ski/tube hill in Grangeville. They have a hill devoted entirely to innertubing, with a rope tow and super fast snow. We had been planning to go for the whole week and we were excited to finally arrive and get started. The kids explored all different kinds of ways to go down the hill -- solo, tandem, sitting in your tube, laying on your tube, etc. We finally decided that our favorite way to go was hooking all four tubes together and all going on our tummies! The snow fell the whole time we were there and it was COLD!! Flying down the hill, the snow would fly in your face. Curtis exclaimed once that he was pretty sure he ate a million snowflakes on the way down. Abby was a maniac, of course, but it was really exciting to watch Curtis enjoying it. He's not much for this kind of stuff, but really loved it. After we dropped Jody off and were headed home, I asked them to rate the fun on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the most fun thing you have ever done. They both decided it was a 10, for sure!

On our way there, I passed a snow plow on the right (I don't recommend it). The kids were thrilled with all the snow that was on our car when we arrived.



















We had a great day! Definitely ready for HOT cocoa and coffee when we were done!

Is it your Human Right to have a cookie?

This was the question that Curtis asked as we walked into a MLK Jr. Celebration in Lewiston tonight when he noticed that they were handing out cookies!

It is an exciting night at our house. Abby has had a countdown for the last week on when "Arockabama" is finally going to be president. Although I am pretty sure they are Obama supporters because their parents are, it is nice to see my kids believing in the process that America goes through to elect a leader. They even know enough to stand up for that belief when necessary. On the day before the election, Curtis told me a story of two boys sitting at his table, telling him that if Obama was elected, horrible people would come to the United States and try to kill everyone. When I asked him what he said, he told me "I told them that it wasn't true and that were trying to scare me into believing what they believed." Wow, pretty wise kid. Later that night, when we watched Obama's victory speech and Obama mentioned that he would work with John McCain, Curtis's face lit up. "See mom, they want to work together!"

Here's to at least 4 years of more peace and working together.

Ice Skating Fun

Abby and her "BFF" Terra have been buddies since they were babies. Maybe even before...her mom, Brandy, and I were pregnant at the same time. They grew up going to the same daycare and saw each other at least 3 times a week. Then, they both started school. Abby in Lewiston and Terra in Moscow. We still try really hard to get them together as often as we can. Today, we traveled to Moscow for some ice skating and got to have Terra join us. It was a great time for the girls, as well as Curtis and mom. Curtis was too fast to get any pictures, but here are a couple of the "buds".

Gonna Give It a Try

So, as I waited...and waited...and waited for sister Stephanie to get rid of the Jeff Duncan story and put a new post on her blog, I decided that I can't really complain about it if I don't do something myself. She has been asking me for months to get one started so that she can read about our life in Lewiston and see more frequent pictures. So here goes!

January has been an exciting month so far! We rang in (well, more like slept in) the New Year with Aunt Carolyn and Uncle Scott in Snohomish, WA. Spent the most fun New Year's Day with family, playing games, watching football and eating! The Northwest winter weather made travel pretty interesting on the way home, but considering that most of the roads we took have since been closed off and on for a week, I think we were pretty lucky!

Back to school this week. I got a small reprieve in that Moscow schools had a snow day on our first scheduled day back. The kids got right back into the swing of things. Our most exciting first-week-back-to-school news was Curtis was named Student of the Week, representing the 3rd grade!!! Most of you know what a HUGE accomplishment this is for him. He got to go out to lunch yesterday with his wonderful principal, Craig Lenzmeier. Curtis is not one for big emotion, but you could definitely tell that he was very proud. Abby started a 6 week basketball clinic last weekend and will be playing every Saturday for about an hour. They don't start official games until 3rd grade, but they meet each week to work on fundamentals, i.e. dribbling, passing, etc. She, of course, loves it.

All the snow is gone, for now! It was amazing to watch nearly 3 feet of snow disappear in a week! Luckily, we are free of the flood worries that the west-side has, although the Snake and Clearwater rivers which run near our house our VERY high, and VERY full of debris!

OK, so my first post is done. Hmmmm, can't figure out how to add pics! Maybe next time!